For decades, the LEGO brand has crossed over with a multitude of multimedia franchises to create various video games, mostly platformers and open-world sandboxes. Thanks to a combination of clever design and entertaining writing, these games manage to be both generally fun and amusing little parodies of the IPs they’re crossing over with. Originally, LEGO games stuck exclusively to movies, but in recent years, video game franchises have started getting this treatment as well.
10 Nintendo Lego Sets That Need to Join Zelda
We’ve only scratched the surface of Nintendo-Lego collaboration.
We first started seeing video game franchises crossing over in LEGO Dimensions, which featured cameos from games like Portal and classic Midway arcade games. More recently, we’ve seen dedicated crossovers with games like Fortnite and Horizon: Zero Dawn. It’s getting to the point where the floodgates could open at any moment and every gaming IP under the sun gets a LEGO game, so we might as well start putting a wishlist together for the ones we want to see the most.
Wouldn’t Be That Much Sillier
The Metal Gear series is ostensibly a very serious drama about the horrors of war and suffering of soldiers, one that may seem inappropriate for LEGO’s inherent silliness. It is also, however, a series where a guy makes a tommy gun out of bees, a giant death weapon is voiced by Hatsune Miku, and a U.S. Senator pummels a cyborg with the power of nanomachines. Would a LEGO Metal Gear really be that much sillier?
The best course of action for a LEGO Metal Gear game would probably be the anthology approach, similar to the LEGO Star Wars games. Start us off chronologically with Metal Gear Solid 3, then gradually work our way through Peace Walker, 5, the original, 2, and 4. Simplify the story a bit, sand down some of the more intense and violent plot beats, and we’ve got ourselves an anthology.
We’d probably play as Big Boss, Snake, and Raiden through all of this, though it would be nice to get to replay levels as other characters, like Volgin or Ocelot. It’d be especially nice to get some spin-off representation so we can play as the Revengeance characters.
9 Mortal Kombat
Minifigs Are Easy To Dismember
The LEGO Games are developed by Traveler’s Tales and published by Warner Bros., which is also TT Games’ parent company. You know what else Warner owns? Netherrealm. You know what Netherrealm makes? Mortal Kombat. That’s why Shaggy made a cameo in that animated Mortal Kombat movie from 2021. If all the corporate dots are already connected, we might as well make a LEGO Mortal Kombat.
Now, you’re probably thinking, “Mortal Kombat’s affinity for bloody dismemberment definitely does not jibe with LEGO’s family-friendly image.” A fair point, but consider this: when you had LEGO sets as a kid, didn’t you pull apart the minifigs on a regular basis? Swapping out heads, legs, and arms regularly? Well, what is that if not PG-friendly dismembering?
All we really have to do is make a regular Mortal Kombat fighting game, and replace the Fatalities with… LEGO-talities, I guess we’ll call them. Have Johnny Cage pop Scorpion’s head off and recite Shakespeare while the head mugs at him in disapproval. Bring back Quan Chi’s classic leg pummel, except he just pops off the other guy’s entire lower body piece. The whole thing would be pretty funny, you have to admit.
8 Mega Man
Build A Better Robot
Mega Man’s primary shtick throughout his games is modularity. He beats Robot Masters, takes their weapons, and uses them for himself, alongside his other miscellaneous upgrades like the Super Adapter. Frankly, I’d say any hero with a sufficient degree of modularity is downright obligated to have a LEGO adaptation. What’s more modular than LEGOs, after all?
The easy choice here is to stick to traditional sidescrolling platforming a la Mega Man 11, just with Mega Man, the enemies, and all the environments rendered in LEGO bricks. Frankly, though, that feels insufficient. If we’re going to do this, we should commit to it, and that includes making more overt use of the LEGO gimmick.
Here’s the pitch: maybe in lieu of his usual variable weapons, Mega Man can grab bricks from the environment and use them on himself to create new weapons and transformations. Build a propeller on his head, a big flamethrower on his arm, tank treads on his legs, and so on. It’d be a fun way to really utilize the LEGO shtick while staying true to Mega Man’s overall vibe.
7 Marvel’s Spider-Man
He’s Already Got A Foot In The Door
Okay, we’re cheating a teensy bit here, since comics and movies are probably the first thing that springs to mind with Spider-Man rather than games. That said, Insomniac’s Spider-Man games are a proper franchise, and if that’s the jumping off point we need to get a dedicated LEGO Spider-Man game, so be it. More to the point, it probably wouldn’t be that difficult to make this happen anyway.
Spider-Man has already appeared in several Marvel-centric LEGO games, so he’s got a model ready to go. Additionally, the central sandbox in LEGO Marvel Super Heroes is New York City, so it’d be a snap to repurpose and expand that city into a full LEGO Queens comparable to the one seen in the Insomniac games. That game was great, so it’s a good map to start with.
So, with all the shortcuts laid out, that just leaves the game itself. It’s not rocket science; grab a sufficiently noteworthy baddie from Web-Head’s rogues gallery and set ‘em loose on the city, then have him swing in and save the day. The combat probably wouldn’t be as elaborate as the main games, but the basic fighting and combat systems should be easy enough to replicate.
6 God Of War
Kratos Deserves A Lighthearted Adventure
You know, after an entire series of God of War games with Kratos screaming his head off and murdering Greek deities, followed by two more adventures of otherworldly familial disputes, I think he’s earned a vacation. Just a nice, low-stakes adventure he can take Atreus on for some quality father-son bonding. If we’re going to tone things down, let’s do it in LEGO.
A LEGO God of War game probably wouldn’t be dissimilar to the LEGO Horizon game. Grab all the major characters, cut the story down a bit; we could frame it as Kratos reminiscing on the events of the 2018 game and Ragnarok with Atreus and Mimir, with all of them either forgetting or embellishing things as the story goes on. Kratos would probably complain at first, then get more into it later.
Every God Of War Game, Ranked By Story
Been on every single one of Kratos’ journeys since his PS2 days? Here is every God of War game ranked based on their story.
We could probably keep most of the major combat and exploratory mechanics, particularly the Leviathan Axe and Kratos’ ability to throw and recall it to activate mechanisms. We’d probably have to lose all the armor and move upgrades, but it wouldn’t be a particularly big loss.
5 Grand Theft Auto
Like LEGO City Undercover, But Naughtier
-
- Released
- September 17, 2013
- ESRB
- M For Mature 17+ due to Blood and Gore, Intense Violence, Mature Humor, Nudity, Strong Language, Strong Sexual Content, Use of Drugs and Alcohol
- Engine
- Rockstar Advanced Game Engine
- Cross Save
- yes
- Steam Deck Compatibility
- yes
- PC Release Date
- April 14, 2015
- Xbox Series X|S Release Date
- March 15, 2022
- PS5 Release Date
- March 15, 2022
- How Long To Beat
- 32 Hours
- Metascore
- 81
- PS Plus Availability
- Extra & Premium
- OpenCritic Rating
- Mighty
- X|S Optimized
- Yes
- File Size Xbox Series
- 84 GB (July 2023)
While Grand Theft Auto could be considered diametrically opposed to the LEGO games’ entire… everything, the LEGO games have actually dabbled in open-world vehicular shenanigans before. LEGO City Undercover was effectively just LEGO Grand Theft Auto, except you were playing as a cop instead of a criminal. Just flip the allegiances, get up to some PG-rated crimes, and you’ve got a kid-friendly LEGO-ified Grand Theft Auto.
Obviously, LEGO wouldn’t sign off on anything too overtly illegal, like drug smuggling or wanton murder, which probably means we can’t bring in any of the established Grand Theft Auto protagonists or plotlines. In lieu of that, we can just make up some new charismatic crook, plop him down in one of GTA’s established cities like San Andreas, and have him get up to some shady shenanigans.
Any old-school crimes like robbing a bank would probably be harmless enough to work in this game, and we could add some silly nonsense to take the bite out of it, like filling the vault with cookies or something. Kids are going to play Grand Theft Auto no matter what, so maybe it’d be a good idea to have a family-friendly take on the franchise available.
4 Pokémon
An Interesting Design Challenge
I’ve often wondered why we don’t have more in the way of Pokémon-themed LEGO sets. They’re literally two of the most profitable brands on Earth, it feels like a perfect match. In all likelihood, it’s probably because Pokémon come in such varied shapes and sizes, making simple minifigs and builds of them all would be tricky, not to mention potentially expensive. Maybe before we get real-life sets, we could test the waters with a LEGO Pokémon game.
In lieu of a traditional Pokémon RPG, a LEGO Pokémon game would probably work best as a simpler sandbox platformer. Give us a few Pokémon to play around with and explore a big city, theme park, or other similarly large area. It’d be like the Pikachu’s Vacation short from the first movie, just a cute, harmless setting to see your favorite Pokémon in with a LEGO twist.
Speaking of, the hard part would obviously be deciding which Pokémon to represent. The easiest option would be to pick all humanoids that can be rendered as minifigs, but that wouldn’t be any fun. It’d be interesting to see an attempt to render some of the weirder Pokémon like Cloyster or Scovillain exclusively in bricks and pegs. Surely some 3D modeler out there is up to such a challenge.
3 Sonic The Hedgehog
Square Legs Wouldn’t Slow Him Down
For those who couldn’t be bothered to buy the toys, and I wouldn’t blame you, Sonic the Hedgehog was actually one of the IPs represented in LEGO Dimensions. He got an entire dedicated set, level, and short story, and even made a cheeky nod to Shadow having a gun well before the third movie did it. Leaving all that work relegated to a DLC pack in a toys-to-life game just isn’t right, so let’s do more with it.
The Sonic level in LEGO Dimensions opted for a hybrid approach, switching between 2.5D sidescrolling levels and 3D areas akin to the original Sonic and Sonic Adventure, respectively. Sonic controlled more or less the same as he does in most games, so we can just use that again and put some new levels together. Dimensions also had some simple recreations of Green Hill and Emerald Coast, though I think I’d like a dedicated game to have more elaborate recreations of classic levels, if that’s the route we’re going.
Also, small note, I think I’d prefer this to just be an entirely LEGO rendition of Sonic, as opposed to regular Sonic turning into LEGO, or meeting his LEGO counterpart, or what have you. Sonic’s dabbled enough in parallel realities for a little while.
2 Donkey Kong
Smashing, Bashing Fun
Playing Donkey Kong Bananza helped me realize two things. First, Donkey Kong is really fun to play as when he can do pretty much whatever he wants. Second, destructible environments are fun to mess with, especially when paired with the aforementioned unchained Donkey Kong. Say, you know what else has destructible environments and characters that are fun to control? LEGO games.
Asking for a LEGO Donkey Kong game with a similar degree of destructibility might be pushing it a bit, but if there’s at least a surplus of buildings, constructs, and simple terrains made of bricks to break down, that would be sufficient. Of course, DK would need his mobility from Bananza preserved so you can freely clamber your way up LEGO stuff and reenact King Kong.
Speaking of Bananza abilities, if we want to stay on brand with DK’s current vibe, that being carting Pauline around and transforming, we could probably integrate all of that into this LEGO game as well. Or, if we want something different, maybe he could reconfigure himself into all kinds of weird shapes or gadgets, kind of like the transformations in Banjo-Kazooie.
1 Super Mario Bros.
Well, Obviously
I can’t be the only one who expected an actual LEGO Mario game when the original LEGO Mario set was announced. The real-life set is cute and all, and it has some game-like elements, but it’s still more of a toy than an actual game. I say it’s high time we got the actual LEGO Mario game we were sort-of-but-not-really promised all those years ago.
There are a couple of ways we could play this one. Option one is to stick close to the established 3D Mario game formula, just with LEGO aesthetics in the mix. Something akin to Super Mario Odyssey would probably work; several large sandbox worlds full of puzzles and LEGO gadgets to solve, maybe with some new brick-based power-ups for Mario thrown into the mix.
Alternatively, we could use the real-life Mario set as a framework, creating fully realized versions of the short courses and playsets from the LEGO Mario toys and accessories. It’d be a smaller game, but there would definitely be a novelty to seeing the little LEGO Mario run and jump his way through a course rather than just moving him around with your hand.
10 Best LEGO Sets Based on Video Games
These 10 LEGO sets perfectly represent some of the greatest gaming consoles, icons, characters, and levels in fun LEGO form.
- Security Camera Installation – indoor/outdoor IP CCTV systems & video analytics
- Access Control Installation – key card, fob, biometric & cloud‑based door entry
- Business Security Systems – integrated alarms, surveillance & access control
- Structured Cabling Services – voice, data & fiber infrastructure for new or existing builds
- Video Monitoring Services – 24/7 remote surveillance and analytics monitoring
Author: 360 Technology Group
